Drought hit nations are suffering from various kinds of challenges and obstacles. India, known for agrarian economy, green revolution and its hard core farmers are now under questions. Many Indian states have declared their tehsils, villages’ districts which have been hit by drought to make them avail compensation. Now let’s take a look at data revealed by IMD.
Recently, Indian meteorological department has revealed the data about India’s drought records. 18 out of 36 states and union territories were hit by the shortage of rain fall and is going deeper, 302 districts out of 641 received sub- par rain. Many states of India have been recording the drought data and some states have declared their districts as drought hit. 141 districts are from Karnataka Maharashtra, Odessa, Madhya Pradesh, Andhra Pradesh and Chhattisgarh while Indian meteorological department, just half of them has recorded deficient rainfall. Secondly, four states have so far declared drought, but as per the data by IMD, they have received normal rainfall. Odessa government has announced 21 districts out of 30 as drought hit, while IMD says that just 8 have faced reduced rainfall. On the other hand Karnataka has declared 27 districts have drought hit while just 12 got deficient rainfall. Talking about Andhra Pradesh, 13 were mentioned by government as drought hit, where IMD says only 2 got reduced rainfalls. This scenario is wider and some other states like Rajasthan, Bihar, Gujarat, Telangana, Jharkhand and Uttar Pradesh will be in the group shorty.
Declaring areas as drought hit is not the end. Some states have released funds to help farmers who have faced wrath of nature. Recently, Chhattisgarh has announced 4000 cr compensation for the 110 tehsils which were declared drought hit. While 1398cr have been allotted by the Jharkhand government for the farmers. Madhya Pradesh has also cleared 8000 cr budget to support drought hit farmers. Some other states are also in the queue. These compensations were made to help farmers to support them form their crashed crops and gearing them for further cropping.
Now here a point arises that declaring drought hit districts helps whom and how. When a state or center declares drought hit, districts, farmers can avail compensation for their crop damages due to weather fluctuations. Some other things that farmers can get it ease in loan, drinking water, livestock support, etc. and when huge amount of compensation is allotted, problem of money leakage and misusage by unauthorized and non-targeted people occurs, that will enjoy the compensation leaving behind the needy. Just allotting fund means nothing, but keeping vigil over the fund and its distribution is a crucial part of this.
Indian farmers are facing serious problems from many sides. Several districts have taken measures to support the farmers as the count of farmers in going down. Climate change, unseasonal rainfall, drought, etc. have made several farmers to leave their job and somewhere it resulted in suicide of farmers. This year several farmers have committed suicide, leaving behind burdens of loans and negligible savings for their families.
